Paul Livingston: for king and country ... and family

Tim Barlass

Unlocking the past: Author and comedian Paul Livingston at the former brewery where his grandfather worked. Photo: Ben Rushton

Once it was considered the height of cowardice - worthy of the receipt of a dreaded white feather.

Going absent without leave, or AWL, during wartime could result in shame for a young serviceman and his family.

There was plenty of hedonism involved and these were kids and they were in love.

Paul Livingston

Even on the streets of Sydney in 1943 there were women armed with feathers, and they were not afraid to use them.

A young Stanley Livingston with his soon-to-be-wife, Evelyn Lonsdale.

Now the taboo has been thrown into the open with the publication of a story about a Sydney soldier who went AWL not once but twice - and was court-martialled to prove it.

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The story of Private Stanley Livingston of the 2/17th Australian Infantry Battalion has surprisingly been made public by his son, performing artist Paul Livingston whose comic alter ego, Flacco, has toured extensively in Australia and internationally.

For years, the younger Livingston had tried to extricate the wartime stories from his father, and he was making progress. Then it was too late when his father died suddenly at the age of 70 in 1988. Or as the author puts it: ''He went AWL from the planet.''

Christmas 1956, in the drivers seat is brother Brian Ernest Livingston and in the back Paul.

Then 18 months ago a nugget of information emerged.

''My brother is a family historian and constantly would send me dates and figures that meant nothing to me,'' Livingston says. ''One day he sent me the court martial which had my father's words on it. Words from 1943. It really struck a nerve.''

His father's words from almost 70 years earlier stated: ''The reason I went AWL for the first time was that my father died just before I returned from the Middle East. In the meantime, my young sister had a breakdown in health so I stayed on for a while longer until she became a bit better and then came back to camp. The reason I went AWL for the second period was the fact that my sister had another breakdown after I had returned to camp. My mother is not alive.''

Paul Livingston in the guise of his alter-ego Flacco.

The period Stanley was absent totalled more than three months - rather longer than the 21 days that could have qualified him as a deserter.

Stanley Livingston, who grew up in Mascot, didn't get the best start in life, with his father Ernie left to bring up five children on his own when his wife, Bridget, died at the age of 48.

Ernie worked at the Tooth and Co Brewery - now under redevelopment, opposite the UTS on Broadway - and where he gained familiarity with the company's product line in more ways than one.

In June 1940, Stanley walked through the gates of Sydney Showground to sign up along with his two best mates, Roy Lonsdale and Gordon Oxman, who happened to have his eye on Stanley's sister, Lilly.

He embarked the following June on the Queen Elizabeth bound for - not that they knew it - El Alamein and desert warfare.

In early 1942 with the attack on Pearl Harbour the previous December and invasion feared in Darwin, Ernie Livingston was given the duty of standing lookout to spot Japanese from the still standing brewery tower. Ernie was one night found asleep at his elevated post, having sampled the factory product a little too eagerly. He was unceremoniously sacked and died in November that year.

On the troopship Aquitania an Australia-bound Stanley received a letter from his eldest sister, Margaret, saying the death of their father had left his sisters distraught. Lilly was worried about the loss of both Stanley and also her first love, Gordon Oxman.

Paul Livingston, writing in Absent Without Leave states that the moral decision came later in Sydney as three weeks' leave was about to run out: ''With her Stan around the house, and Gordon never far away, Lilly's condition had improved, but the thought of losing them again distressed her, and Stanley and Gordon were reluctant to leave.''

Stanley was also spending time with his girlfriend Evelyn Lonsdale, Roy's sister. The trio were not only brothers in arms but were, one day, to become brothers-in-law.

Over a quiet beer, the three of them decided to turn their leave into a stay. When the battalion returned to duty at Narellan camp near Camden at 0645 hours on March 23 there were three (maybe more) absentees.

But without the status of their uniforms they soon stood out as able-bodied young males who, maybe, should have been elsewhere.

''As they avoided sideways glances from the public, and the full frontal stares of uniformed officers on official leave, the leeches in the Atherton Tablelands [training camp] were looking more and more appealing.''

For women, having a boyfriend out of uniform was a symbol of no status. Livingston writes: ''Once satisfied that Lilly was in good shape and in good hands, the pair [Livingston and Oxman] decided to put up their own and surrender.''

They marched into camp in northern Queensland under close arrest in April 1943. But the return was short-lived and another letter arrived from home. Just 48 hours after arriving, Livingston and Oxman were again declared AWL.

Once more back home in June 1943 - at a time The Sydney Morning Herald said war in the Pacific was ''dark and full of menace'' - Stanley celebrated his 25th birthday at the Glaciarium ice rink in Railway Square before making his way to the ''jolliest dance in town'' at a George Street ballroom. Stanley had his days free while future bride Evelyn was working for the war effort as a riveter at Sydney Airport repairing military aircraft.

After 109 days absent, rumours arrived that the battalion was about to leave Australia. Livingston and Oxman surrendered in Sydney and were returned to the unit at Dead Man's Gully, north of Cairns, as it was about to depart for jungle warfare. At the court martial Livingston was found guilty of both counts of AWL, was fined £20 and forfeited ordinary pay for 90 days. Oxman was fined the same with hard labour thrown in. Then it was off for both of them, with no jungle training, to meet the Japanese in New Guinea.

Paul Livingston, speaking over a beer at a hotel possibly frequented by his dad in the shadow of the former Tooth's brewery, says that growing up he had no sense of shame for his father's actions.

''I knew that he was a bit of a ratbag in his youth, a gambler and a drinker and a pretty bad fighter, he usually lost. It wouldn't have surprised me that [going AWL] was a part of his nature,'' he says. ''There's no doubt that it wasn't just a heroic act of going back to your family to help your family. There was plenty of hedonism involved and these were kids and they were in love. There were two women there they were desperately in love with.

''People don't like talking about AWL. I think the public history of war is very much about heroics, honour pride, and duty to country. That's not the whole story. AWL itself was extremely common.

''He didn't run away from battle, he didn't run away from responsibility to his country and he didn't run away from responsibility to his family. Somehow he made that balance work - and a lot of them did.''